Chapter 39: The Digital Barrier
Needless to say, Izzy was surprised by the email that he received from Kari. It said that they had just found Gatomon and chased Daemon back to the digital world after destroying his earring. It sounded almost too good to be true, but when we all met together at Izzy's house, Gatomon was there, and everyone was in a great mood.
"How much damage was done to the city, though?" Ken questioned.
"Quite a bit. Most of the area around the bay was completely destroyed," Matt said. "We did everything we could to minimize the damage, but Daemon was way too powerful."
"I still don't understand why Angewomon was able to break the earring." Kari said.
"The inscription makes sense if you just think about for a second," Izzy said. "The first part was about a wooden stake going through a heart. If you recall some mythological lore, one way to kill a vampire is to drive a wooden stake through their heart. We could interpret this as meaning a stake that pierced Myotismon's heart five years ago, except that that stake was made of light and not wood, hence it fills the requirements of the second part of the inscription."
"I guess that works, sort of," Davis said, apparently still confused.
"We've got something more important to think about right now, we've got an opportunity to beat Daemon once and for all," Izzy said. "I think we should focus on that right now."
"It sounds like you've got a plan, Izzy," Sora said.
"I do, and I believe that it will work perfectly this time," Izzy said.
"Alright, let's hear it," Tai said.
"Well, the biggest problem that we have is Daemon's ability to teleport between the two worlds," Izzy began. "But I think I can prevent him from doing this. Five years ago, when Myotismon was taking over the city, Gennai sent me a digital barrier program. The program made and life forms within its range invisible to digimon."
"So we're going to fight him while being invisible?" Joe asked.
"No, I don't think that would work. The digital barrier is only highly effective if the things that are hiding remain mostly motionless. However, I may be able to modify the program and turn it into an actual barrier to digital data. I'll set it up in a wide sphere around Daemon and he won't be able to teleport while in the sphere. Unfortunately, if he leaves the sphere he will be able to, so we have to keep the sphere a secret from him so that he doesn't know how to escape," Izzy told everyone.
"Alright, so now what about the hard part?" Cody asked. "Actually defeating him."
"Well, I figured that Michael's done it before, so I was hoping that he'd have some bright ideas,' Izzy said, turning to Michael.
Michael nodded. "When we killed Daemon before, it was actually Metalskullhydramon that managed to finish him off. He used a powerful attack called Abomination, which set off a massive explosion of energy right on Daemon, immediately deleting him."
"Great, then we'll use the same plan," TK said.
"It's not that simple, I'm afraid. For one thing, Daemon is now wise to that idea, so he'll be looking for it and will most likely attempt to evade it," Michael explained. "Furthermore, the attack drains all of Metalskullhydramon's energy, reducing him to Dremon immediately afterward."
"So we only get one shot at this, and if we miss, then we have to fight him for real," Matt said.
"That would be difficult," Michael began. "Daemon is still extremely strong. He was beating both Metalseadramon and Metalskullhydramon until the latter used his Abomination attack. If Metalskullhydramon misses, we'll be down to four mega-level digimon. While that may seem an advantage, we're still not sure just how powerful Daemon really is, even in his normal form."
"That's a good point, but we may not get another chance to destroy him so easily. Right now he's fuming from losing his earring and weakened by the battle, plus he doesn't have the army he stole from Myotismon organized to defend himself. We've got to strike now." Tai said.
"Alright, then we'll just have to be careful. We'll have the other four mega level digimon engage him and try to get him distracted, and Metalskullhydramon will take the first clear shot he gets when he sees that Daemon isn't watching him," Izzy said. "In the event that this plan fails, we simply fight him as best we can."
"Sounds like a plan, Izzy," Sora said.
"Okay, I'll need a little while to work on the digital barrier program. Once it's completed, I'll call everyone together. Be ready to leave at any time, we're not going to wait once this thing is ready," Izzy said.
"Izzy, just how long will it take you to fix the digital barrier?" Yolei asked.
"It could take all night, so I'd advise everyone go home and get some sleep. The digimon are probably tired from their battle today anyways, so leaving tonight would be foolish," Izzy said.
Everyone began to slowly file out of the room, bidding each other good night and Izzy good luck with his programming. Ken offered to stay and help, but Izzy said that he needed to get home so that Wormmon could rest.
"Izzy, don't you need your rest too?" I asked him once everyone had left.
"Don't worry about me, Tentomon. I'm good at operating on little sleep. You should probably get some, though," he replied.
"It's not like I'm going to be able to fight effectively tomorrow, Izzy. I'll stay up and help you."
"No, we may need you in the fight. Even if you can't directly hurt Daemon, there may be other ways that you can help everyone. Joe said that Zudomon helped to tackle Daemon into the bay yesterday," Izzy told me.
"Yes, but that blew up in their faces, now didn't it?" I said.
"That's not really the point, Tentomon. Under the right circumstances, any of our digimon may be able to help defeat Daemon, you included. I'm not saying that you'll be doing most of the fighting, but you need to make sure you're at full strength, just in case," Izzy told me.
"If you say so, Izzy," I said. I curled up on the little bed that Izzy had made me and tried to fall asleep. The incessant drone of Izzy's typing kept me awake for a few minutes, but my mind eventually tuned it out, and dozed off.
"Tentomon, wake up," Izzy said as he shook me awake. I slowly opened my eyes and rose out of the bed, stretching and yawning.
"How'd the digital barrier go?" I asked as my vision cleared.
"It's all set to go. Now we just need to call everyone together and we can start it up," Izzy said.
"Shouldn't we have breakfast first, Izzy?" I moaned, feeling my empty stomach complaining.
"I'm way ahead of you, buddy," Izzy said, opening the door. "My mom already cooked some for us. I ate already, but there's plenty left. Dig in while I start making phone calls," he said.
I quickly complied, saying a quick thank you to Izzy's mom before I started eating. Izzy was on the phone the entire time, waking everyone else up and telling them to make sure the digimon get plenty to eat. We all remembered how hard it was to fight on an empty stomach.
"You sure you don't want some more, Tentomon?" Izzy's mom asked me as I hovered down from the chair.
"Thank you, but I couldn't possible eat another bite," I said. Just then, the doorbell rang.
"That must be someone starting to arrive," Izzy said. He opened the door to let Tai, Kari, Agumon, and Gatomon in.
"So, when do we leave?" Tai asked.
"As soon as everybody gets here," Izzy replied happily. He didn't seem tired at all.
"Good, I can't wait to get this fight over with," Kari said.
The room slowly filled with people until everyone was accounted for. Tai ran through a quick role call to make sure nobody was missing, and then Izzy took the floor.
"Alright, I've targeted the digital gate to bring us right to Myotismon's castle, where I believe Daemon is. The digital barrier is fully functional, and should work as I planned, but it will only last for three hours after activation, so we need to finish the fight as quickly as possible. Everyone understands the plan?"
There was a general chorus of assent from the entire group.
"Alright, let's get going then!" Izzy said. This time Kari stepped forward with her D-3 and opened the gate up. One by one we all passed through it, and we found ourselves in a forest, just outside of Myotismon's old castle, which Daemon now occupied.
I turned to look up at the castle, as did everyone else, and there, standing upon the roof and staring right at us, though it was hard to tell if he actually could see us or not, was Daemon.
"Alright, here we go," Matt said as the clearing exploded with the light of digivolution.
Agumon warp digivolve to…..:::::Wargreymon!
Drakamon warp digivolve to…..:::::Metalskullhydramon!
Gobumon warp digivolve to…..:::::Metalgarurumon!
Betamon warp digivolve to…..:::::Metalseadramon!
Veemon, Wormmon, DNA warp digivolve to…..:::::Imperialdramon!
Author's Note: I know I made up that DNA warp digivolve thing. I didn't feel like wasting space writing out all of the digivolutions required to get to Imperialdramon.